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UK Government Live Webchat on ID Cards

The UK's Chief Executive of the Identity and Passport Service, James Hall, answers your ID Card questions. Or does he?

Was the UK Government's ID Card webchat a genuine attempt to provide answers - or just another example of spin and avoidance?

San Francisco, CA December 8, 2006 -- IT Security (itsecurity.com) announces an in-depth white paper and discussion of the UK National ID Card Scheme. On 14 November, James Hall held a live webchat to answer questions on the UK National ID Card scheme. Questions were accepted in advance, and others were taken during the process. The advertised purpose read:

Do you welcome the introduction of ID cards and the National Identity scheme? Are you worried about how secure your personal data will be? Do you think the cards will be good value for money, or are you concerned about the likely cost of the scheme?

Pose your question to James Hall now.

This should have been the perfect opportunity for the government to make its case with genuine facts and figures; and for the people to get answers to their genuine concerns.

But all governments, and some might say this one in particular, have been known to spin, avoid and generally manipulate information to support their own ends. We wanted to make sure that this couldn't happen - at least not without us knowing about it.

IT Security submitted 17 security-related questions - and waited to see what would happen. These were genuine questions. They were not trick questions or unreasonable questions. They were questions raised by practicing security professionals.

What happened? Did the government address our concerns? Did it operate an honest and open and fair webchat? Did it provide genuine answers?

Kevin Townsend has published a detailed white paper on the whole project. "This white paper," he says, "includes the full transcript of the webchat including the questions taken and the answers given. It also includes the security questions we sent in advance. Seventeen were sent - two were answered. Did the government avoid our questions, and just take friendly or easy questions? You can decide for yourself."

But we don't want to leave it there. This debate is too important. We have also created an open discussion area containing all the questions and answers from the webchat, and all the questions we sent in ourselves. You can see what security professionals are concerned about; you can see the answers given by the government - and you can join in. Join this debate at http://www.itsecurity.com/expert/category/id-discussion/ . If you've got concerns, if you're for or against - voice your opinions here.

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